Welcome to the Forum Archive!

Years of conversation fill a ton of digital pages, and we've kept all of it accessible to browse or copy over. Whether you're looking for reveal articles for older champions, or the first time that Rammus rolled into an "OK" thread, or anything in between, you can find it here. When you're finished, check out the boards to join in the latest League of Legends discussions.

Vulgarity's Guide to Pantheon

I wouldn't say that brutalizer is only good mid game, if your enemies (more then just the tank) start getting armor items so you are forced to get a Last Whisper, brutalizer synergizes very well with it. With runes and masteries you have about 40 flat pen.

If you prefer to get stark's and black cleaver instead of last whisper, brutalizer can still be useful. It helps you do more damage faster, until you get all your black cleaver stacks and also helps some on enemies with over 85 armor.

That's very true, I feel it really loses it's luster at about that point where you can be getting more out of other items over the whole course of the game, phage for instance. Although, I admit there is merit in keeping the brutalizer in his build since there are very few items for the price that can compete with what it offers as far as straight synergy for Pantheon. When I do put it to use it is very nice considering that I have 50 flat penetration (35 from runes/masteries + 15 from brutalizer).

For me it's a very hard decision, especially in those instances where I want to rush my first BF sword. It becomes a question of: do you grab brut and offset your BF sword a few minutes (longer if you're starved for kills for whatever reason) or grab right after and offset completing your first BF weapon. Decisions decisions. More often than not I err on the side of the BF sword and space out the brutalizer since by the time you get the BF your damage jumps significantly.

I would like to just point out that my own personal build for pantheon goes like this
Long sword + HP x1
boots of speed
recurve bow
last whisper
Infinity edge
vamp scepter
sheen
bloodthirster or executioners calling
trinity force

When my buddy pasky asked me why I chose to get last whispers so early on, its because I feel after I get it through with it'll be most of the armor pen i'll ever need till black cleaver, and its all the attack speed pantheon needs all game long.
I skipping getting sword of the occult because it seemed a lot of other items were more valuable, trinity force procs a lot off all your spells allowing you to really hit hard, and the rest of the items are purely AD and armor pen.

Really I'd rather just stick to corki then make pantheon my third main, got enough tier 3 mains already.

I would like to just point out that my own personal build for pantheon goes like this
Long sword + HP x1
boots of speed
recurve bow
last whisper
Infinity edge
vamp scepter
sheen
bloodthirster or executioners calling
trinity force

When my buddy pasky asked me why I chose to get last whispers so early on, its because I feel after I get it through with it'll be most of the armor pen i'll ever need till black cleaver, and its all the attack speed pantheon needs all game long.
I skipping getting sword of the occult because it seemed a lot of other items were more valuable, trinity force procs a lot off all your spells allowing you to really hit hard, and the rest of the items are purely AD and armor pen.

Really I'd rather just stick to corki then make pantheon my third main, got enough tier 3 mains already.

That was pretty much how I built for my first 15 or so games. Sheen is really underated in my experience for Pantheon, Q is easily spammable for the guaranteed 3s proc and with some damage already built it is quite delicious. But finding the perfect place to fit it is the hard part. Too early and you sacrifice too much, too late and it's wasted damage.

So, to open this up a little more into a discussion and make this guide not just a guide but a thread for intelligent discussion on more than just builds. At what level of play do most of you feel Pantheon is best at and why? Low Elo, Mid, High? What does he bring to the table at each level and how do you feel he matches up against other common champions at that level?

I would like to just point out that my own personal build for pantheon goes like this
Long sword + HP x1
boots of speed
recurve bow
last whisper
Infinity edge
vamp scepter
sheen
bloodthirster or executioners calling
trinity force

When my buddy pasky asked me why I chose to get last whispers so early on, its because I feel after I get it through with it'll be most of the armor pen i'll ever need till black cleaver, and its all the attack speed pantheon needs all game long.
I skipping getting sword of the occult because it seemed a lot of other items were more valuable, trinity force procs a lot off all your spells allowing you to really hit hard, and the rest of the items are purely AD and armor pen.

Really I'd rather just stick to corki then make pantheon my third main, got enough tier 3 mains already.

I really don't think getting last whisper that early is good or necessary. 9 times out of ten if the enemy gets a defensive item that soon it will be some kind of hp item. You really do not need last whisper till after you have at least 2 big damage items, if you need it at all. It really just delays your getting +damage which allows you to own with your abilities mid game.

Also I really don't think TF is all that useful. The bonus adds about 150 damage to your attack.
I would guess that in the time that you can get 2 TF procs, you would spear twice, autoattack twice, and heartseeker once.

TF's proc would give you 300 damage over this time.
300=(1.4*2+1.5+2*1)*(+dmg)
+dmg= 47.6
This means that the passive from TF would be equivalent to a 48 dmg item. However this doesn't take into account the fact that the +damage item would be increased by your crit chance, crit damage, and attack speed.
I wouldn't say its a horrible item for Pantheon, I just am rarely in a situation were it would be that helpful. Either I am free to stack straight damage and survivability from TF wouldn't help much or I need more survivability then what TF gives and I get a BV or something.

Edit: As for ELO i think I am somewhere in the mid ELO range (I mainly solo queue so ya) and although he generally doesn't carry as well as some of the others, he can if he gets fed early game. He is a very good early game killer, and great end game backdoorer. Late game he is best use to jump in mid team fight, stun their carry the use heartseeker to damage everyone, and then spear to hopefully finish off their carry.

In low elo he can carry teams quite easily, just rack up some early game kills, and faceroll the rest of the game, getting triple kills with heartseeker.

In high elo I would assume it is the same as mid ELO, although it is harder to guarantee a good start from early game kills, you might have to wait for your first BF and Ult to start getting more kills.

Ick, time to perform some necromancy. But not in a way that would be considered wrong and immoral (can you do something wrong but me morally correct?).

From what I have seen of Pantheon in each of the brackets I've played him in (having had the occasional chance to play in a higher Elo as well as smurfing in the lower brackets). I would say that he is probably a best fit at the mid Elo and definitely brings some solid AOE (though considerably less aoe than some champions) to the higher Elo brackets. My thoughts on each bracket as follows:

Low Elo: pubstomper for sure. In the correct hands he is devastating, with a pumped up heartseeker over spearshot you have the makings of an excellent ganker. Seeing as how poorly most solo-mid champs are played in this game, you can effectively take Pantheon solo-mid with q and w (hold off till 5 for e) and probably walk away with a gank by level 2 if not sooner. Pantheon's damage is deceptively good at low level scales very well if he gets the level and gear advantage from a solo-farm.

Mid Elo: This is where I have the most experience on him. Most players know how to handle a melee (hint hint: kite and don't let him close the distance). Here you'll be playing a little different, you'll be using Aegis of Zeonia to initiate any attacks. In team fights you bring a stun and heavy damage from heartseeker, placed properly you see big numbers and lots of health dropping. Sadly I feel this is where you feel the most hurt from how hard his ulti is to land on opponents. He's strong 1v1 but begins falling apart in anything bigger than a 2v2 where once you've blown aegis + heartseeker and with the long CD on heartseeker pantheon ends up outshined by traditional aoe champions.

I feel he fits in amongst the melee carries very well and is at his absolute best late games after he has farmed. The problem is, keeping control and not overextending at all til the point where you can succesfully feast on everyone.

In my limited high Elo experience he becomes a little more restricted, especially in the current meta where AOE and disables rule all. He melts under aoe and focus fire (which most champs do) and being melee he will most likely be in the heat of things and taking the brunt of that damage. Sadly, here you're focusing more on adding a little more survivability (frozen mallet/banshee's) to mitigate some of that damage and trying to come into the fight as fashionably late as possible to clean up.

i've just started playing pantheon and i really have no idea what runes to use atm i have armor pen for red runes, flat health for yellow runes, some attack speed runes in blue and more armor pen for purple.

usually i start off with boots 2+health pots and a mana pot so i can spam the sht out of q.
I have noticed that panth owns in early game but then late game i see him slip and he really isnt a threat any more so could any one help me here?

One thing I've found with panth that makes a huge difference is how you use aegis of zonia. Prioitize lvling it, and get brutalizer, nashors, or other cd reducation that fits into your build, and have cd reducation runes in blue, as well as cd reduction in your masteries. This is a huge advantage at ganking with his ult at higher lvls. You should be laning till lvl 6, then jumping on the ganking train till the group phase. With a good team Pantheon can feed your main carry like crazy.